Are Documentaries Art?
When I first sat down to interview Chris Hegedus and D A Pennebaker, they asked me the title of this book. My answer kicked off a lively discussion on the validity of classifying documentaries as art.
DAP: I think that documentaries—films in general—are different in most people’s minds from what they consider art. They know that paintings, which cost $16 to paint and now sell for $120 million, have to be an art form, because nothing else could account for that value. But I think that the films are not really art. Perhaps old films, and European films are sometimes—because of the way they’re dealt with. But you would hardly ...
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